Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
7.1.2 Legal requirements for ecological information
Law, as I consider in this chapter, can be used in a variety of ways to require
the provision of ecological information. There are, as explained in the
following paragraphs and considered in detail in
Sections 7.2
7.4
,three
important considerations in the design of legal and institutional structures if
these are to provide support for decision-making processes under ecological
governance. The
-
rst is that improving knowledge and understanding of
ecosystem dynamics and of maintaining programmes of research which
make that possible should be prioritised. This is a departure from prior
approaches in which legal instruments have been used to generate environ-
mental information only at the point where the adoption of plans or
decision-making on particular projects is due to occur, and with that
information being used to temper the pursuit of economic and social
objectives. However, the focus under ecological governance is not on gath-
ering information to determine the tolerability of particular disturbances.
Instead, it is on learning more about ecosystems and about what makes
them resilient so that we are better able to identify and reduce reliance on
activities that could erode this property. Improved knowledge of how
ecosystems function at landscape scales would also, as I contend in
Chapter 5
, be used to channel development towards areas in which it is
judged to present low levels of risk for ecosystem integrity when the
cumulative impacts of all other activities are taken into account.
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The second is that institutions for conducting research and for ensur-
ing that
ows of information are maintained should be legally embedded
within, and given a central role in, the system
'
soperation.Thisisto
re
ect the fact that the structures being put in place are to create a
permanent capacity for increasing human understanding of ecosystem
behaviour. The creation of an institutional capacity for learning and
building on what has been learnt are also required if the core systemic
objective of constant growth in levels of understanding and knowledge of
ecosystems based on which our ability to forestall their further degrada-
tion might be enhanced is to be advanced. As argued in
Section 7.2
,the
aim of creating a platform for better ecological regulation would not be
furthered signi
cantly by the ad hoc commissioning of research by
decision-makers as environmental problems arise.
Third, legal mechanisms are required to maintain a
ow of informa-
tion about the health of ecosystems.Policies,plansanddecisionson
7
Chapter 5,
Sections 5.3.2
and
5.3.4
.
